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Marzo 26, 2011
A Man may make a Remark
by Emily Dickinson
A Man may make a Remark -
In itself - a quiet thing
That may furnish the Fuse unto a Spark
In dormant nature - lain -
Let us divide - with skill -
Let us discourse - with care -
Powder exists in Charcoal -
Before it exists in Fire -
Posted by sarita at 10:49 AM
Marzo 12, 2011
Excerpts from Immortality
There are two methods for cultivating the uniqueness of the self: the method of addition and the method of subtraction. Agnes subtracts from herself everything that is exterior and borrowed, in order to come closer to her sheer essence (even with the risk that zero lurks at the bottom of the subtraction). Laura's method is precisely the opposite: in order to make her self ever more visible, perceivable, seizable, sizable, she keeps adding to it more and more attributes and she attempts to identify herself with them (with the risk that the essence of the self may be buried by the additional attributes). p 100
She saw in the cat... a constancy of charm (so different from human charm, which is always spoiled by moments of clumsiness and unattractiveness) ... p 100
Intelligence in politics piece - p 121-2
Imagine this situation: a little girl approaches a little boy. She starts taking off her clothes and says, "Doctor, you have to examine me." And the little boy says, "My dear little girl! I am no doctor!" This is exactly how Paul behaved. p168
What is unbearable in life is not being but being one's self. The Creator, with his computer, released into the world billions of selves as well as their lives. But apart from this quantity of lives it is possible to imagine some primordial being that was present even before the Creator began to create, a being that was - and still is - beyond his influence. When she lay on the ground that day and the monotonous sound of the stream flowed into her, cleansing her of the self, the dirt of the self, she participated in that primordial being, which manifested itself in the voice of fleeting time and the blue of the sky; she now knows there is nothing more beautiful.
The road she drove onto from the highway was quiet, and distant stars, infinitely distant stars, shone over it. Agnes drove on and thought: Living, there is no happiness in that. Living: carrying one's painful self through the world.
But being, being is happiness. Being: becoming a fountain, on which the universe falls like warm rain. p 258-9
Posted by sarita at 2:44 PM
Marzo 2, 2011
Psalm of Home Redux
Psalm of Home Redux
by David Lee
after rereading Cormac McCarthy and taking
a 5 mile run through the River Ranch
Laughter is also a form of prayer
—Kierkegaard
Okay then, right here,
Lord, in Bandera,
tether me to my shadow
like a fat spavined mule
stuck sideways in Texas tank mud
bawling for eternity
At midnight's closing whine
of the 11th Street Bar's steel guitar,
when the stars slip their traces
and race the moon like wild horses
to their death in the darkness,
let my hoarse song twine with the night wind
May the bray of today's good laughter
fall like a brittle top branch
wind nudged from a sprawling live oak
straight down like early spring sleet
to the hill country's bent
and trembling bluebonnet covered knees
Posted by sarita at 9:34 PM